Dental implant surgery involves placing a prosthetic device such as one or more artificial replacement teeth in the mouth of a patient. Such prosthetic devices must be precisely placed in the mouth for the best aesthetic and functional results. Precise placement of the prosthetic device requires suitable preparation of the implant site with respect to surrounding tissue and bone. The prosthetic device typically comprises a tooth implant abutment, a pontic attached thereto, and a tooth implant fixture that extends from the abutment and is received into an implant shaft drilled into the patient's bone with a drilling tool (e.g., dental handpiece). During the drilling of bone to create the implant shaft, great care must be taken to avoid causing injury to the patient. Injury may be caused by, for example, inadvertent entry into the mandibular nerve canal, inadvertent entry into the sinuses, perforation of the cortical plates, damage to adjacent teeth, or other damage known in the art.
Systems that provide real-time imaging of implant sites can be helpful to the implant practitioner is avoiding injury to patients and in more accurately preparing the bone, implant site, and preparation of the shaft for receiving the implant. Conventional systems that provide such imaging can be cumbersome, complicated, and difficult to use. Moreover, the images provided by systems that rely on optical (viewable) images can be limited by images that are obscured by fluids, including blood and water found at the implant site during drilling. In addition, some computer-assisted imaging systems are not especially accurate in determining location of anatomical structures and instruments, nor are they especially accurate in updating such location information in real-time during the drilling procedure.
Improved real-time imaging would assist the implant practitioner with precise location of the drilling tool during the procedure and would benefit the patient by reducing the risk of injury and helping to provide an effective implant. Such techniques could also be used in a variety of procedures, beyond the dental field, including, for example, other health practices and non-medical procedures.
What is needed is improved real-time imaging support for dental implant surgery. Embodiments of the invention satisfy this need.